03/24/2026
A topic came up at our weekly community session last night that I think needs to be talked about more.
There’s a deep sense of grief and regret that comes up when you start trying to quit drinking - and they can hang on for years after you’ve stopped.
You look back and you start seeing all the loss. The moments lost into oblivion because alcohol was clouding your mind. The pictures that show you being there, but there’s no memory of it. What feels like hundreds of bedtimes with your kids, hundreds of evenings with your spouse, hundreds of meals and get-togethers with friends… that you missed because you let alcohol come first.
That hurts. There’s no denying it.
It’s important - even necessary - to find ways to process these feelings, because otherwise they’re going to keep you trapped. Either you’ll keep drowning in the shame of it and drink to ease the pain, or you’ll go through life sober and miserable, thinking of everything you lost that you can’t get back, and hating yourself for it.
Let’s be clear: there’s no “make it go away” here. That loss is real.
But you can start looking at it differently. You can start looking at it in a way that makes it possible to carry it with you, without having it be such a burden that you can’t move forward.
Over the next few days, I’ll share some of what we said in last night’s chat. I hope you'll join in throughout the week by sharing your thoughts.
For now, we’d love to hear from you. What do you most regret that you’ve missed out on because of alcohol?
